Identification of MicroRNA Expression Patterns in Cutaneous and Uveal Melanoma Cell Lines

Aims And Background: microRNA (miRNA)-mediated epigenetic regulation of tumor suppressor genes and oncogenes has been shown to play a central role in melanomagenesis. Here, we focused on the identification of miRNA signatures in the cutaneous melanoma cell line G361 and the uveal melanoma cell line OCM-1.

Methods And Study Design: We carried out genome-wide miRNA expression profiling using a human miRNA microarray platform (Agilent Sanger miRBase, release 10.1) in both cell lines.

Results: Our screening revealed significant alteration of miRNA expression profiles in melanoma cell lines compared with normal human epidermal melanocytes. We defined 208 differentially expressed miRNAs in OCM-1 and 112 in G361. By comparison analysis between the resulting miRNA expression profiles, we identified 96 miRNAs that were modified in both cell models. Among these commonly modified miRNAs, 65 were downregulated, 28 upregulated, and 3 exhibited a different expression trend.

Conclusions: Although preliminary, our analysis identified new melanoma-associated miRNAs providing novel miRNA candidates for the development of anticancer target therapy.